Born in Crumpsall on July 23 1942 and raised in Gorton, then a working class area of Manchester, Hindley lived in a house that was in such poor condition that she and her parents slept in the only available bedroom.

Her parents, Nellie and Bob Hindley, beat her regularly as a young child, and Bob was an alcoholic.

They would regularly read books on philosophy, crime and torture, and Hindley would often hire a van, where the two would plan bank robberies.

She claimed that Brady began talking about ‘committing the perfect murder’ in July 1963, and on July 12 the two murdered their first victim, 16 year old Pauline Reade.

Their next victim, John Kilbride, was killed on November 23 1963.

During the 1990s, Hindley stated that she only took part in the killings because Brady had drugged her, was blackmailing her with pornographic photos he had taken of her, and had threatened to kill her younger sister, Maureen.

Myra Hindley (1942 – 2002), left, circa 1965 (Picture: Getty)

In 2009, a television documentary series on female serial killers was broadcast on ITV3, and Hindley’s solicitor Andrew McCooey reported that she had said to him: ‘I ought to have been hanged. I deserved it.

‘My crime was worse than Brady’s because I enticed the children and they would never have entered the car without my role … I have always regarded myself as worse than Brady.’